Turkish PM criticizes CHP leader over Ottoman language row

ANKARA

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu speaks before his departure to Poland, Dec. 8. AA Photo

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu has accused the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) of “acting with enmity toward their own history,” while also describing the debates over the Ottoman language courses as simply “a storm in a teacup.”

“The student who wants to choose [the Ottoman language class] can do so. The student who doesn’t want to, doesn’t choose it. This is the proposal. What is this allergy for history? What is this enmity for culture? It is not possible to understand,” Davutoğlu said on Dec. 8.

The CHP has slammed the government over the issue, saying it doesnot have a problem only with the Republic or the principle of secularism, but rather with the "transformation that began in the 1800s" in the Ottoman era.

“You will on the one hand speak about science and technology, while on the other hand you will make irrelevant 18th and 19th century decisions. Even the Ottomans would not make these decisions,” CHP Deputy Parliamentary Group Chair Akif Hamzaçebi said at a press conference on Dec. 8.

“The transformation that the Ottoman [Empire] carried out from the beginning of the 1800s is a transformation that he [Erdoğan] could not accept,” Hamzaçebi added.